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Young Canadians renting out their homes to fund mortgage payments

A growing number of Canadian millennials are utilizing short-term rental platforms such as Airbnb to support their mortgage payments, according to a recent survey by research firm Altus Group.

The survey found that approximately 7 per cent of Canadian households with a mortgage have rented out at least parts of their homes over the past year, The Huffington Post Canada reported.

Roughly 22 per cent of millennial mortgage holders in Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, or Calgary relied on Airbnb to make just a bit more cash. In particular, young Toronto home owners spent over half of their rental income on monthly expenses, with 39 per cent going to monthly mortgages (in a city where the average monthly mortgage payment is around $3,300, according to RateHub).

However, while Airbnb has emerged as a popular option among home owners and renters alike, a Toronto-based coalition has called on city authorities to take on a stricter approach to the short-term rental market.

In its recent report, Fairbnb—an alliance of hotel groups and rental associations—argued that the short-term condo rental sector epitomized by Airbnb has done more harm than good to the chances of prospective tenants.

“I think it definitely has (contributed to the rental crisis),” according to Fairbnb’s Thorben Wieditz, as quoted by CityNews.

“The city of Toronto’s vacancy rate is 1.3 per cent — in some of the condo buildings and condo districts it’s actually below one per cent — and removing any units of the housing market will definitely decrease the supply and increase the demand, increase the prices, and make it more difficult for people to find a place to live.”

Faribnb is strongly advocating for a “one host, one listing” policy, which is designed to address the phenomenon of some buyers/renters controlling multiple properties.

“There are about 12,000 listings in the city of Toronto, and one of the remarkable things we found … is that 16 per cent of the hosts that rent out on Airbnb have multiple listings on the platform at any given moment,” Wieditz explained, adding that these hosts hold roughly 40 per cent of the city’s Airbnb listings.

“The overarching goal of our policy recommendations is to put any available rental listing back onto the traditional rental market.”